Béne did not know what to say.
This was totally unexpected.
He motioned to a rum bottle in one of the niches.
“For the duppies,” Frank said. “The spirits like their drink. We replenish it every once in a while so they’re never without.”
He knew the custom. His father’s grave outside Kingston was similarly stocked.
“There’s more,” Frank said. “But, as with all things Maroon, it is a tale told only among a select few. Mainly Scientists, who considered this room sacred.”
Béne had never cared for Maroon healers, who’d taken the odd name of Scientist. Too much mysticism for him, too few results.
“Is that why there’s an altar?” he asked.
Frank nodded. “The Scientists once conducted rituals here. Private things that only they could see.”
“Not anymore?” he asked.
“Not in a long while. And there’s a reason for that.”
“You keep a lot of secrets,” he said to Frank.
“As I’ve told you many times, some things are better left unsaid … until the right moment.”
“So tell me your tale.”
Frank explained about a time when there were four other objects in the chamber. A golden candlestick, about a meter high, with seven branches. A table, less than a meter long and half that high, with golden crowns bordering the top and a ring at each corner. And two trumpets, made of silver, each about a meter long, inlaid with gold.
“Are you sure of those?” Tre asked.
“I never saw them myself, but I talked to others who say they did.”
“Those are the most sacred objects in Judaism. They came from the Second Temple, when Jerusalem was sacked by the Romans. People have searched for those for 2,000 years. And they were here? In Jamaica?”
“They had been placed with the Hebrew grave. I was told that they were magnificent in workmanship.”
“And no Maroon ever tried to sell them?” Tre asked.
Frank shook his head. “The spirits are important to us. They roam the forests and can either protect or harm. Never would we offend them by taking something from a grave. Instead, we protected those objects and made this place special.”
Béne faced Tre. “What does all this mean?”
“That a lot of history books are going to be rewritten.”
But Béne was more concerned with something else. “What happened to those objects?”
“The Scientists returned here one day and the treasures were gone. Only colonels and Scientists knew of this location. They concluded that the duppies took them away. After that, this place was no longer used for worship.”
“When was this?” Béne asked.
“Sixty years ago.”
Béne shook his head. Another dead end. “Is that it? People wanted me killed to protect this?”
“These graves are important. They are our past. And for a Maroon, the past is all we have. Even the Hebrew grave is important. It is clearly from long ago. The Jews helped us when no one else would. So we honored the Hebrew, as one of us. His treasure was also honored.”
“And now it’s gone.”
But he wondered. Were those objects what Zachariah Simon was really after? He’d talked about finding Columbus’ grave and the mine, but it made more sense that Simon would be after a treasure. Apparently this place had indeed been a gold mine, but for a different style of gold.
Which did not exist anymore.
He shook his head and headed back for the cave’s exit.
Tre and Frank followed.
None of them said a word.
CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE
TOM WATCHED AS THE MERCEDES MERGED INTO TRAFFIC AND turned the corner, disappearing. The woman, whoever the hell she was, knew everything. And his salvation depended on finding the Temple treasure. How was that possible? Why would that be possible?
A hand touched his shoulder, startling him.
He turned.
Berlinger stared back and said, “She’s gone.”
“Who is she?” he demanded. “She said you knew she was here.”
The old man shook his head. “I did. But she did not identify herself, nor did I ask.”
“But you did what she wanted. You made sure I heard what she had to say.”
“I saw no harm in that.”
“Rabbi, this is important to me. What the hell is going on here?”
“I have to show you something and tell you a few things. Important things.”
“Where’s Alle?”
“I don’t know.”
“Your cameras can’t find her?”
“I’m sure they can. But this we have to do alone.”
“You have no idea what I’ve gone through. No idea what happened to me.”
He was exasperated.
And angry.
“Come,” Berlinger said. “Walk with me and I’ll tell you a story.”
“My father passed this on to me,” Marc Cross said to Berlinger.
He listened as his friend explained.
“The first Levite was Luis de Torres, who was given the task by Columbus. The duty has been passed for five hundred years from one to the next, and all has been fine until recently.”
The Second World War had been over nearly ten years, but its remnants remained. Nobody knew, as yet, how many millions of Jews had been slaughtered. Six million was the number most widely bantered. Here, in Prague, the pogrom’s effects were clear. A hundred thousand were taken, only a handful returned.
“It’s our Temple treasures,” Marc said. “The sacred objects. That’s the secret we hold. Columbus took them to the New World. His voyage was financed by Jews of the Spanish court. Ferdinand and Isabella were useless. They lacked either the vision or the money to explore. Columbus possessed the vision, and the Sephardi Jews of Spain provided the money. Of course, they’d all been forced to convert in order to stay in Spain, and Columbus too was a converso.”
He’d never heard such a thing. “Columbus was a Jew?”
Marc nodded. “And remained one all of his life. He sailed to the New World hoping that he would find a place where we could live in peace. A prevalent theory of the time said that Jews in the Far East lived free, without persecution. He, of course, thought he was sailing to Asia. That’s why he brought de Torres with him. A Hebrew translator. Someone who could speak to the people he found.”
This was amazing.
“The Sephardi Jews had long protected the Temple treasure. It was brought to them in the 7th century. But in 1492, Spain became a dangerous place. All of the Jews had either been expelled or converted. The Inquisition was rooting out the faintest hint of false Christianity. To even be suspected of being Jewish meant death, and thousands were executed. So they tasked Columbus with a special mission. Take the Temple treasure with him. When he found those Asian Jews, have them protect it.”
“But there were no Jews waiting for him.”
Marc shook his head. “And when he finally realized that, at the end of his fourth voyage, he hid the treasure in his New World. Luis de Torres was there and assumed the duty of guardian, calling himself the Levite. I am his successor.”
“You know where our precious objects rest?”
“That I do. To reveal this to anyone is a violation of my duty, but what happened during the war changes things. I need your help, good friend. This is something I cannot do alone. You are the most honest man I know.”
He smiled at the compliment. “I would say the same about you.”